Left the house about 7:20
AM.† There was some construction on
I-35, but we were early enough where the traffic moved along well; even where
it was single lane.

The plan was to stop at the
McDonaldís in Two Harbors and get an angus burgers for our first dinner on
Brule Lake.† However we got there so
early that they were serving breakfast so no angus burgers for us.

Got up to the Tofte Ranger
Station without much trouble, had to watch their 10 minute Boundary Waters
video, answer some test questions, pay $16 each for a permit to enter the
BWCA;† they gave us a nice garbage bag
to pack out all of our trash and we were on our way.

Enroute to Brule Lake, our
entry point, we tried to find something for dinner.† We looked at Lutsen but their prices were astronomical, so we
kept going.† Luckily we passed a coffee
shop that had sandwiches that was right before our turnoff on the Caribou Trail
(Hwy 4).†

We made great time getting
to Brule and there were quite a few cars in the parking lot, but we didnít see
any people.† We got all three Duluth
packs in the canoe, the day pack, the fishing pole, life jackets and it started
to rain.† The canoe was sitting at the
take off point and John hadnít even gotten the ropes in the car; the car still
sitting at the edge of the lake.† It
started raining harder.† We sat in the
car.† It literally started pouring.† It was most disconcerting.† And then it stopped.† John parked the car.† I bailed out the canoe, and we were on our
way.

There were many campsites on
Brule, but we werenít able to find an open site until about the 8th
site we passed.† It was a nice
site.† However the weather was so humid
that most all of our stuff remained wet or at least very damp.

John went fishing, I paddled
along and he caught 5 northern and 1 teeny little muskie Ė about 5 inches long;
about the size of the lure.† We saw 1
beaver and a beautiful sunset and my favorite part - we got to listen to the
loons.

Sunday September 13th

†

Got up and portaged 40 rods
into Lily Lake, then 40 rods into Mulligan, then we were supposed to do 40 rods
into Grassy Lake followed by 200 rods into Wannigan.† However, Grassy Lake was like almost nonexistent so we got to
portage 340 rods to get to Wannigan Lake.†
According to the map we should have been able to paddle from Wannigan
right into Winchell Lake, but such was not the case.† We had a short, but tricky portage of about 20 rods to get into
Winchell.

The way we do our portaging
is that John carries the canoe and I carry one of the packs to the end.† Then we both walk back to the beginning and
get the remaining packs.† Therefore with
all the portaging (on our first day out no less) we covered over 4 miles.† It was a tiring day.

We are camped on Winchell
Lake at a beautiful, huge, site with many large boulders going right into the
lake.† We dried everything out since the
day was sunny and the wind picked up after we got here.

John caught only 1
northern.† To do the fishing, we like to
go back into the bays to try to find those fish.

Monday September 14th

Tried fishing as we left
Winchell Ė no luck.† Winchell is a long
skinny lake and we had to paddle east about 4 miles to our portage into Gaskin
Lake.† Enroute, John noticed a
ďmountainĒ without any trees on it.† It
turned out that there had been a fire there.†
We know because we got out of the canoe and climbed it.† Although there were no trees, there was a
lot of brush and new trees about 4 feet high.†
It was pretty tough going.† When
we got to the top, we could look out and see Winchell below us plus we could
look over and see Gaskin and the portage that we would be doing.

So here we are camped now on
Gaskin Lake and this is the best site ever!†
It is on an island and the site is unusually huge.† Plus itís up on a hill and you can look out
and see way down the lake.† Itís also a
nice open site and our tent will be up on the hill.† There are 2 big flat boulders up there that are about 3 feet high
that we can lay on at night to look at the stars.† John likes to look at the satellites go zooming by.† And we have the deluxe version of a latrine
at this site.† Itís pretty snazzy.

John caught 1 small mouth
bass and 2 northern.† We generally go
out to fish around 6 pm because that is usually when they seem to bite the
most.

There was a beautiful sunset
tonight.† It was windy during the
day.† Frequently at night and early in
the morning the lake is as clear as glass.†
The temperature has been very warm and the sun is hot.† Yet when you are in the shade itís almost
cool.† Nights are great for sleeping,
not too hot, not freezing cold, just comfortable in a sleeping bag.† Sunrise is around 6:45, sunset about
7:15.† Unfortunately we are heading
toward a new moon so we havenít seen the moon, but the amount of stars in
overwhelming.

Tuesday September 15th

Left our site on Gaskin,
there was lots of dew last night.† The
tent was very wet. We paddled a short distance to our 40 rod portage.† Except for the first 15 feet which was
almost straight up, the portage was ok.†
Sometimes it is almost impossible to do these portages.† But we figured that was the reason that
everyone else who came into Gaskin Lake was using the other portage.

John caught a northern on
Jump Lake, that first little lake that we first portaged into. We did another
easy portage of 24 rods into Allen Lake.†
Allen Lake was a really skinny lake, the last half mile being about 30
feet across.† Luckily there was water in
it and no rocks (on which to bang our canoe). John caught 2 small mouth bass in
Allen Lake, one of them was probably 2-3 pounds.

We portage 95 rods into
Pillsbury Lake where we found a campsite.†
It was small, but very nice.† The
cooking grate is right on the water and weíll put the tent up on a little
hill.† Should be good star viewing up
there.

Did I mention our canoe has
a leak?† In fact 2 leaks, and both
arenít that bad.† John always brings a
canoe repair kit and is in the process of fixing the problem now. -----------

Repair report: The hardner
didnít harden, but there was enough of the goop that got put in the holes, and
then John put duct tape on it and it seems to be working.

We went out in the evening
to fish and saw a beaver.† He slapped
his tail at us as if to say ďyouíre too near my houseĒ.† We went on and John caught probably 5 fish Ė
most of them northern, and at least 1 small mouth bass.†

It got really windy at night
and quite chilly, and cloudy Ė no stars.

Wednesday September 16th

We left Pillsbury Lake and
portaged 58 rods into Henson Lake.†
Henson is kind of a long lake, but in the middle of the lake it opens up
to a wider more circular area.† As we were
paddling toward that area, John spotted a moose in the water.† It turned out that there were 3 of them,
apparently eating the vegetation along the shore.† We have never seen moose before in the middle of the morning on a
lake.† Usually they are way back in the
smaller rivers and are quite a ways back. †They took off quickly and John was not able to get a picture of
them.† We havenít seen any people for 2
days and maybe the moose thought that canoe season was over.† We could hear them stomping and snorting in
the woods, after we chased them off, but could not see them.

We paddled on and portaged
34 rods into Omega Lake where John almost immediately caught a fish.† As we went on, he found a regular ďfishing
holeĒ and caught 2-3 northern† and 1
small mouth bass all in the same area in about 5 minutes.

We had to wait to portage
back into into Winchell as there were 2 people coming from Winchell into Omega.
And as it happened, we are back in our same big beautiful site on Winchell that
we were camped in before.

Thursday September 17th

We portaged from Winchell
into Wannigan.† And we thought we heard
people behind us, but didnít see anyone.†
Then we portaged a very short distance into Cliff Lake, a small lake,
and John fished on most of the way to the next portage.† As we were removing everything from the
canoe for the long portage (152 rods into North Cone Lake), we saw that there
were people behind us.† It turned out to
be the people (4 of them) that were camped 2 sites down from us on Winchell.† We had talked to them when we were first on
Winchell and they had said that they were leaving on Thursday.

So we started first and as
we were going back to get the rest of the packs, we would pass one another as
they had to also make 2 trips. Even though†
it was a long portage it was relatively flat , to slightly downhill and
not bad.†††††††††

North Cone Lake had no
campsite and to get to Middle Cone, we just had to lift everything out of the
canoe and carry the packs and canoe about 10 feet (and over a big fallen log).

We stopped at the campsite
on Middle Cone and had lunch and let everybody pass us (those other people that
were behind us on the portage and one other group of 4).† While we were eating a weasel ran thru the
site, down near the water.† And a
butterfly came and landed on my leg.

So after lunch we left and
portaged 25 fairly easy rods into South Cone Lake and paddled over to the
campsite and here we are.

The weather changes from
windy to quiet, from dark clouds to intense sun.† It must be at least 70 degrees; the sun being extremely hot..

John has caught 2
northern.† He really had to fish long
and hard to get the first one.† Then he
was sitting in the canoe at our campsite and the lure was like barely dangling
in the water and a really small northern bit the lure.† We thought it was extremely ironic.

John saw 3 lake otters as he
was out fishing.† They stopped and like
stood up tall in the water and scolded him.

Friday September 18th

We spent this day at the
same campsite as yesterday, in South Cone Lake.† Itís practically our own lake since this is the only
campsite.† And from our point of view,
we canít even see the people who are portaging between Middle and South
Cone.† So itís like weíre here alone.† Itís great.

The weather has been
incredible.† Itís been very warm, and no
rain.† Itís also strange in that it gets
quite windy from the south, many dark clouds appear and then the wind stops and
the clouds are gone.† Then half an hour
later it get really windy from the west, there are many clouds, and a little while
later there is only blue sky.† We had
that happen about 4 times yesterday and today.

Today we did a practice
portage into Cone Bay, which will take us back into Brule Lake. We went in to
check out the fishing and just see what the portage looked like.† The portage was short and easy but it was
hard to land the canoe because of so many rocks.

We canoed and fished for a
couple hours, checked out all the empty campsites (our site on South Cone is by
far the best), and we had lunch.† Cone
Bay is actually a part of Brule Lake. Weíll have to paddle through some
wideopen water tomorrow.† Weíre hoping
for wind out of the north and west.

As we were canoeing today on
Cone Lake we saw 2 bald eagles!† After
not catching any fish, we portaged back to South Cone Lake where our tent is
and John immediately started catching fish again Ė a small mouth bass that we
had for dinner.† We fished after dinner,
but were unable to catch any fish.

Saturday September 19th

Last night while doing our
evening fishing, John did catch a fish; sort of.† It was a northern and the fish was not cooperating and while John
had the jaw spreader in itís mouth the fish fell into the lake, with the jaw
spreader in itís mouth.

There was also an owl that
we heard, but were not able to see it.

We portaged into Cone Bay,
and as we were beginning to make our way across the big lake (Brule), the eagle
came back, right to a big tree where we were canoeing.† He made all kinds of noise.† Yesterday when we had seen the eagles, we
tried paddling after them, but werenít able to get very close as they would
keep flying further away.† So today, it
was like he stopped over to say goodbye to us.†
And then as we were continuing on, we saw some more big birds, that
didnít have the markings of a bald eagle.†
We were able to get fairly close.†
Also the 2 bald eagles were flying around in the same area.† We determined that the unmarked birds were
probably young bald eagles.

On the way back to where our
van was parked, John fished a lot, but with no success.† They were not biting.

Right after we landed and
were taking the canoe out, another canoe group of 3, in one canoe, came up to
take their canoe out. They had spent 5 days, but the whole time they stayed on
Brule. It was pretty funny because they had so much stuff in that canoe.† And they said they had been on Lake Brule
last year and had caught a lot of fish.†
But this year they didnít get any.

We packed up and left in
beautiful weather.† We stopped at
McDonalds, again, in Two Harbors and we each had an angus burger.† They are very good.† We got home without a problem.† Canít wait to go back next year.